


Light a Fire Beneath Your Feet

by Go1dwords



Series: And we rise; and we fall (from the beginning to the end) [1]
Category: Hades (Video Game 2018)
Genre: Coronacht - the Heart-Seeker, Descriptive first run I suppose, Gen, Skelly (Hades Video Game) - Freeform, Stygius - the Blade of the Underworld, Tartarus (Hades Video Game), Underworld, god this obsession is going to be a problem isn’t it, kinda just mentioned in passing tho
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-19
Updated: 2020-10-19
Packaged: 2021-03-07 19:47:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,737
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26743120
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Go1dwords/pseuds/Go1dwords
Summary: The Underworld has a reputation to uphold.He tries, anyway.(Or — Zagreus’ first run and his sudden return thereof)
Series: And we rise; and we fall (from the beginning to the end) [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1965472
Comments: 6
Kudos: 42





	Light a Fire Beneath Your Feet

**Author's Note:**

> Yeah, this game’s pretty cool.
> 
> *Casually sips Dionysus’ kid-friendly grape juice while understating the existential crisis that I’ve been going through since this game came out.*
> 
> I’m not dying at all haha.
> 
> Cheers!

_“Goodbye, Father.”  
_

_*  
*  
*_

The darkest part of the Underworld eternally languishes in a pool of death and green light, a dripping land where the fires are emerald and the pillars shake and dislodge death from up above and bones are imbedded as gemstones into the walls.

Tartarus encompasses — the fire in the courtyard, the shades milling about, the columns, the pits — _everything_. There is no escape for its residents (or, _from_ its residents, depending on who you are), nor its ghastly glow.

The Styx, foggy with the haze of translucent limbs reaching out, gurgles red and sluggishly below the vast stone walkway outside the House. It sounds of trapped souls and eternal torment, if one listened closely to the bubbling. The pieced-together slats of dark rock that make up the path are splattered with residues from past evils and deeds that crumble to dust from any movement that passes over them.

The dead are plentiful down in Tartarus. The walls and the ground and the rivers are chock-full of them, and even more file into the House, to seek audience with the Lord of the Dead himself. The land may be devoid of life, but it is filled with the empty, echoing sounds made by the quiet wailing of spirits long gone.

Zagreus cares not to stop for the shades nor the souls today (Tonight? Time moves a little funny here. Or maybe it doesn't move at all). He runs past dark, snake-eyed pillars and ghostly hands that grasp at his ankles, leaving scorch marks in the stone underfoot. A novelty once, these sculptures were to him — not anymore, though. He thinks that perhaps Father could have had better taste when commissioning the interior design of Tartarus. He'll add it to the list of reasons why he hates it here.

With fire, he says, ”To Hell with this place.” The words feel alive on his tongue, the only thing alive here besides himself, and he relishes in their taste.

He stops in front of the door that leads out towards the true territory of Tartarus, staring up at it in a mix of awe and contempt. Stygius lies dormant and obedient in his hands, cold and warm at the same time, solid - _real_. Metal is something he understands. There is no faking the hack-and-slash of it. Indeed — Stygius is his friend, and quite possibly the only one that he will have after this endeavor.

Adrenaline washes over him at the thought, and his blood roars in his ears. The fire underneath his feet burns hotter.

Zagreus wets his lips, tasting ash and blood and anticipation, and opens the door.

*  
*  
*

The room is filled with Wretches and pots and columns and various traps.

Zagreus cuts down the Wretches, smashes the pots, destroys the columns and generally tries to avoid running into the traps that leave him bloodier and bloodier each time he comes into contact with them. Father seemed to have fire-proofed the spikes so that even the flames from his steps do not melt the contraptions. He supposes that he should stay out of them.

(Nothing is an accident in his Father's domain. Zagreus wonders what the traps had been for, originally. They were most likely some soul's horrid, eternal punishment. Surely Hades had better things to do than to think up contraptions to stop his son's escape.)

”Who’s next?” Zagreus asks, teeth bared, expression wild and bloody and grinning. More foes appear.

He is trembling from excitement, bouncing on his toes. His heels make hissing sounds as they come into contact with the floor. The adrenaline makes him sloppy, just a little too eager to get into the thick of it all, but he thinks of how displeased father would be at the destruction he has sown, and the pain turns into a self-satisfied ache that feels _good._

Stygius gets warmer and warmer in his hands, and then there are no more wretches appearing, and he is almost disappointed.

Zagreus blinks and startles as a glow descends from the sky, a curious golden-gray, appearing between one second and the next. A sign of some sort — _oh._

Stygius vibrates once, and falls still.

The light falls just to eye-level, and he blinks, seeing his own red and green irises reflected back before widening in understanding.

”There she is,” he breathes. “It’s got to be her.” He fixes himself quickly, reaching out towards the light. “Then here goes nothing... _Ahem_ – In the name of Hades! Olympus, I accept this message.”

Athena answers the call, and Zagreus nearly cheers. It _is_ her, then. _Hail, noble Cousin..._

The Goddess of Wisdom is proud, regal, brilliant. Her words are sure, confident, and when Zagreus is promised the help of all on Olympus, he accepts, smiling and giddy. Her power flows through him, settles from his toes to the tips of his hair.

Athena disappears, but her light continues to shine from _somewhere_. Did Stygius become sharper?

”I know you can’t hear me all the way from where you are, Goddess,” Zagreus says. “But thank you.”

*  
*  
*

He might have gotten ahead of himself. Just a little.

He moves onto another room. Then another. Then another.

The giddiness fades from his bones for each one that he passes, the clanging of Stygius against knuckleheads ringing in his ears, and the condescending grind as the doors open to reveal more Tartarus scraping raw against his limited patience.

Gods, how many _are there?_ Did Father send every single one of his wretches to stop him? He must be going in circles; and yet, Zagreus swears that each room is different than the last, an endless labyrinth that left and right just as much as it goes up. It is enough that frustration starts to make itself known.

And then, inevitably....

A single misstep.

Pain shoots through his feet, then his arms, then his chest. It pierces him, cold and sudden, and Zagreus shouts, voice breaking and fading. Stygius falls against the stained, dirty stone of Tartarus, but he does not hear it. Liquid bubbles up his throat, and Zagreus doesn't dare look down at the spike trap that has finally caught him, choking on his own blood. His eyesight shudders, and the Wretches and Witches that slowly advanced blink into darkness as a familiar river of red appears. He dangles limply above it precariously, held by some invisible force by the waist.

No. _No!_

Zagreus is helpless but to let the Styx take him, a cry stuck in his throat. He drops and falls, and whatever he wants to say disappears underneath the waves of rolling scarlet.

What a waste.

*  
*  
*

There is no time between unconsciousness and waking. One moment he is a second away from passing out, the next he is wide-awake, neck-deep in the Pool, and -

“I’m...home.”

Zagreus grimaces as he pulls himself out. Crimson runs down his fingers, through his hair, splatter onto the floor like blooming gardens of red. His burning feet sputter alive against the corridor of the House.

There is a long line of green shades. Many of them stare at Zagreus.

Ah — the walk of shame.

Hypnos is a familiar sight, slumbering at the side of the hallway. He jolts awake as Zagreus is passing and beams, rubbing his eyes. _“Welcome to the House of Hades! I — wait, I know you!”_

He swallows down embarrassment at being back within the House — evidence of his failure — and instead seeks out Cerberus. Achilles. Nyx.

And after them all, inevitably — Father. _“How was your wanton ransacking of my domain, boy?”_

Old faces. Old grudges. Zagreus grits his teeth and spits defiance in light of his father’s scorn, frustration and bitter poison upon his lips, running through his blood, spilt or otherwise.

He sneers when Hades dismisses him with a wave of a hand and a scoff, brows ever-knitted together. Large and imposing and an utter _asshole._

Zagreus leaves the hall, skeddaddling as fast and furiously as he can make it. He hates being under his Father’s scrutiny, and scorching the tiles of the House is but one of the small things that he does purposefully to piss off his old man. Everything seems less important now, apart from the admittedly-petty anger that drives him to spurn his father and attempt to escape once more. Seeing Hades’ himself after dying had granted Zagreus nothing but more fuel for hate.

He passes his own room (No doors? No doors — _never doors_ , because Zagrues is granted no trust by his father here), pausing only for the briefest of moments. Mirror. Mess. It's not _that bad_ , is it?

He does not look at the bed. Zagreus is sure that if he lays down now, the fire that had finally ignited in his heart since he set his mind to this endeavor would inevitably go out.

The courtyard. A new weapon, locked in ghostly chains _(who - ?)._ Oh, he got keys as he was pushing past Tartarus, didn't he? He frees the bow — much like how one would unfetter a criminal, perhaps — and the shackles fall away and melt like ice into the ground. Coronacht the heart-seeker lays in his hands, just as warm and familiar as Stygius.

New weapons and also new faces, apparently. Zagreus gets a shock when Skelly appears. A handful of minutes in the dangerous part of Tartarus seems to have already made him jumpy of those golden-yellow sigils that etch themselves into the floor. _Blood and darkness_ , he nearly had a heart attack.

Finally, the window. Glowing and bright in the gloom of the courtyard.

He can...try again? He can try _again_.

The thought hits him like a toppling pillar, and he boggles for a second. Zagreus does not know why it did not occur to him that his first run does not need to be his last. That, despite the ever-shifting chambers, as long as the House remains the same, he has all the chances in the Underworld to leave.

Zagreus blinks hard, and his breath catches in his throat before a smile splits across his face, violently uncontrollable.

Skelly eyes him with curiosity. Coronacht sings.

Zagreus puts a hand to the window. This wretched House cannot stop him. _Father_ cannot stop him.

Mind made a long time ago, Zagreus runs. His feet crackle with flames as he dashes out once more. A trail of fire is left in his wake for but a moment before burning into cinders.

 _Again_.

**Author's Note:**

> Could you tell that I died to a spike trap on my first run?
> 
> Considering that I’ve been watching people play Hades before I got the game, it was, quite frankly, embarrassing -.-
> 
> This ended up being more descriptive rather than introspective, oops. Guess I’ll write that at a later date.


End file.
